Quite Ugly One Morning Read Online Free PDF Page A

soar above heights his father had never imagined, was that he had been the one with the vision to realise that there was an exception to the rule – that there was something you could invest in which guaranteed vast returns for negligible risk.
    It was called the Conservative and Unionist Party of Great Britain.
    Obviously it was not just a simple matter of pouring in ostentatious contributions and being awarded lucrative contracts, although that did happen at a more upscale level than he was operating on, and usually carried the obligation to employ one of the appropriate senior minister’s uselessoffspring. No. It was a question of having still more vision to see where the returns would appear, strategically placing oneself to reap their benefits to the full.
    Stephen had served his management apprenticeship under his father’s tutelage, been given control of the old man’s biscuit business in his early twenties after he and his university had discovered a mutual incompatibility. He knew the old man had clearly seen the bigger picture when he encouraged him to seek a post with another firm, obviously appreciating that the sudden high-gradient plummet into debt of BakeLime Biscuits was merely a teething problem of a doubtlessly brilliant long-term strategy.
    Out on his own in the real world, his on-going investment worked a little like a nest egg or even a trust fund, helping him make a proper start in the business world through contacts and management appointments. Observing his superiors, he knew he had a lot to learn, but was sharp enough to see the qualities that made them so invaluable. They could see the wood for the trees, were not distracted by trivia and kept their eye on the bigger picture. They knew the fact that the last three companies whose boards you served on went rapidly and resoundingly bankrupt did not reflect on your management abilities or your suitability for a vacant post. Eddies in the currency markets, union skullduggery, interest rate fluctuations – these such unstable factors were what knocked companies for six in spite of first-class leadership and visionary business strategy.
    He watched the men above him bravely rise, phoenix-like, from the ashes of a closed concern, to take the reins elsewhere with an optimistic smile and a fatter pay-packet.
    And, as he reassuringly discovered, many of them had invested too.
    Never forgetting his father’s words, he put most of his money to work, and in the family tradition, backed favourites at low odds, watching his personal assets slowly but steadily multiply.
    Above all, he was patient, always aware that he was still on a learning curve, gathering the knowledge that would serve him when the right opportunity presented itself and when he was ready to take it.
    ***

    When opportunity knocked, it did so fairly quietly, so much so that it took a while for him to hear and to recognise.
    It was vital to the direction the government was taking the NHS that the right people had their hands on the helms of the nascent Trusts, and his reliable political sympathies plus a healthy annual tax-deductable charitable contribution made him ideal material for a quango post. He was appointed to the board of St George’s NHS Trust in his native Romford, 30Ka year to attend a few meetings a week, very much the kind of occasional, mid-level dividend he had expected from his on-going investment.
    But when he took up his position and looked a little closer, he could not believe the magnitude of the opportunities that lay before him. The government were slicing up the biggest public pie in British history and he would be well placed to fill his plate.
    The National Health Service was an aberration, no other way to describe it. It was such an affront to Conservative values and ideology that he was sure Thatcher would have happily closed the whole thing and grudgingly paid for the humane putting down of anyone who got ill but couldn’t afford private healthcare. It had a